Now that there are new allegations of a campus rape, this time at Cornell University, a 2017 clip of left-wing author and professor Camille Paglia has been circulating on social media. Paglia slams modern women for wanting to have it both ways on sexual consent.
Paglia resents the fact that despite the sexual revolution of the 20th century, women can claim to be empowered one moment and then coddled like helpless children in the next.
Anyone who has followed Paglia over the years will not be surprised by this, as she’s made similar comments before.
Transcript by Real Clear Politics:
QUESTION: You don’t think there’s a problem with sexual assault? Because a lot of women are coming forward now.
CAMILE PAGLIA: No. In cases of real rape, of course it should be prosecuted. Of course real rape is a crime.
But this is not real rape.
We’ve been arguing about dating encounters with miscommunications now for decades. It’s absolutely infantilizing to women. It must stop.
QUESTION: But you know that a lot of women are afraid of sexual assault or have been sexually assaulted.
Should they not be able to go and drink and play beer pong and get drunk like the guys do? They live in fear.
CAMILE PAGLIA: If you go to a fraternity-house party, with the chaos going on in the living-room area, and a young man says to you, “Would you like to go up to my room?” I’m sorry — you are consenting to sex.
He is right to think you have consented to go up there.
You can change your mind, and of course it’s not right for anyone to impose themselves sexually on another person. Naturally.
But women must realize they are now free.
The sexual revolution has been won.
Why are we coddling young women, saying, “Go on being children, because Mommy and Daddy will be there to pick up the pieces for you afterward”?
QUESTION: Shouldn’t men be afraid of the consequences of not getting consent?
CAMILE PAGLIA: We have laws on the books against rape.
QUESTION: But everybody in that world will tell you it’s almost impossible for women to have the strength to come forward, to make the case, and so on.
CAMILE PAGLIA: Lord, are we going to go on like this, making endless excuses for middle-class girls — confused, unsure of what they want?
Perhaps the sexual revolution should be reversed.
Because what we’re showing is that perhaps coeducation is a bad idea.
Maybe today’s young women are not prepared for coeducation.
Watch the whole thing below:
The eternally validated Camille Paglia
Women cannot have it both ways, they can’t insist on coddling and being infantilized and not being held responsible for reckless choices,
and then also demand equal rights and total sexual liberation/freedom https://t.co/fwTVfPZR3E pic.twitter.com/BJQoC82vDz
— temu temüjin 🐴 (@rawdogmillionar) September 30, 2026
Featured image via Twitter/X video.
UPDATE: I originally thought this was a recent clip and that Paglia was reacting specifically to the Cornell case. I regret the error.
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